Love it or hate it: Showering

Love itGo on all you want about how excessive showering strips your body of invaluable oils. And how it wastes precious water and the resources needed to heat it. I’d say I care, but I don’t.

I had a friend in college who stopped showering regularly, claiming that the human body produced its own natural deodorant. He smelled like a barnyard.

I love showering because I have irrational fears about smelling foul. If I ever smell a bad odor, I automatically assume it’s me. Drive past a feedlot? Must be me. Burn out my brakes going down Wolf Creek Pass? Must be time to change my drawers. Microwave some borscht for lunch? I may be awash in a coat of stench. There’s only one way to remedy this: Showering.

I love the steam, the guaranteed warm up or cool down, the morning wakeup, and the time to ponder life before I’ve started my day. In fact, I can’t even call it a day unless, and until, I’ve showered.

David Holub Hate itShowering, I hate it. The only time I like water cloaking my naked form is when I’m running through ocean surf worshipping poetry and chaos with roguish authors, which happens more than you’d think when visiting the state of Rhode Island.

But showers? No. I hate showers.

The average American shower lasts about 8.2 minutes. In that time, about 17 gallons of water goes down the drain. That’s about 1.2 trillion gallons of water in America alone.

In addition to being a magnificent waste of water in a time when 1 in 10 people on this earth still drink from an unprotected water source, I don’t like the fact that it feels like a waste of time. I try to maximize my shower time. If I have to do this dumb cleaning routine, I’m going to sip my tea and learn basic French while I do it, or, at the very least, listen to music.

Also, to be vain, I most definitely do not look like Phoebe Cates in “Fast Times at Ridgemont High, when I’m drenched. Granted, she’s exiting a pool, but still, completely wet, she looks like a slick-haired goddess. Totally wet, I look like a curmudgeonly rat woman. I’m sure that’s only gonna get prettier as I age.

Showers can suck it. I’ll keep that 17 gallons worth of water for my coffee, please and thank you.